back in business

my plan is moving forward. our weekend turned out too busy for sewing, but when my 3yr old needed a bath this morning, i thought, "it's splish splash stash time!" i figure if i squeeze in bits when i can, i will eventually get something done. my goal was to simply square off the four fabrics for a new 4sq blanket while she bathed. my starter project dilemma got decided for me when i got invited to a baby shower this weekend, so 4sq blanket it was. then the 9yr old walked in on me cutting and asked when she could work on the blanket for her teacher's baby. the little splasher was still happily swimming/getting clean, so we squared off teacher's fabrics, too. little splasher still didn't want to get out, so i put the 9 yr old to work sewing her top.

she's learned a lot about sewing in her 3 classes she took from kelly, but she had some trouble keeping her seam straight today. her other projects haven't required as much precision as i was expecting/needing for this blanket. we couldn't figure out why her seam kept wandering to the left and she had difficulty self-correcting. this is a gift, so i was totally hovering over her, lending a hand.  i was pretty patient with her, but i could have been a tad less exasperated. i don't want to put off her confidence. together we survived and got her top sewn. i'll take the blanket from here, doing the back and the blanket stitch myself. before she makes a gift for someone else all by herself, i want her to have more practice. i plan on her making her own larger version of the 4sq for herself, using 8 to 12 squares. that should give her some good experience with the seams and the blanket stitching.

once she was done with her top, i realized it would be only a matter of minutes for me to do the 3 seams required to get my top together and just did it.

the colors don't show well in this photo - the red is actually deeper, less tomato - but here's the top. should be simple enough to add the back tomorrow and get stitching on the edges. i love easy, quick-satisfaction projects! very gratifying.

by the time i was done sewing, i insisted the little fish in my bawthroom remove herself to dry land. she was pruned beyond belief and turning purple. when she started crying about being so cold, i sat her in a chair and wrapped her quilt around her.

that warmed up her chilly body and put a huge grin on her face. the last few weeks she's been playing with her quilt a lot. even though i never completely finished off that last bit of embellishment on the top, she's enjoying the quilt so i just let her use it. maybe i never will finish it, but i don't think baby cares at this point. maybe i don't either. maybe for now it's good enough. being loved and used was it's purpose anyway, even if it's not 100% done.